Akihiro Nishino Brings Storybook Magic to New York City
Dedication, skill and creativity are three words to describe comedian and artist Akihiro Nishino's (above) pen illustrations. Traveling the world for inspiration, Nishino spends months at a time crafting each of the drawings that end up becoming his beautifully illustrated books. This past weekend, for the first time, Nishino travelled with his work to the USA to show off his trademark hyper-detailed art at One Art Space in New York City.
The sheer amount of stuff in each of Akihiro Nishino's drawings is shocking. Done tirelessly with a .03mm pen, each picture has so much work put into it that you can stare at any given panel for half an hour without fully grasping everything that is happening inside it. When asked, Mr. Nishino noted that he goes through hundreds per pens per book, and that the best time for him to use a pen is when it is on its last legs and produces even finer lines than intended. Amazingly, like a high resolution photo, when blown up to several times their size, his work does not lose clarity and even looks better in a large format.
Despite his knack for drawing, the artist hasn't previously considered doing large, gallery type work or working in other mediums. Even director Tim Burton, also famous for his intricate work, has suggested Nishino try his hand at animation.
Akihiro's exhibit at One Art Space was dedicated entirely to showing off the artwork from his three illustrated stories,
Dr. Ink’s Starry Sky Cinema
,
Zip & Candy -Christmas for Robots-,
and
The Music Box Planet
. Each story was displayed in the gallery with translations below each panel creating an interactive experience that drew Japanese fans familiar with Akihiro Nishino's work, as well as NYCers fascinated by his art style. We hope Mr. Nishino will make his return to The States with another art show in the future. If you're eager to get your hands on his work, you can try
on your local Japanese book store. For future cool exhibits like this one, you can check out
online. See some more photos of the show below.
